Undisclosed
by matrixaffiliate
Summary: Lily doesn't want to keep secrets from James, but how does she even begin to explain this? Mauraders era James/Lily fluff story. One-shot. Canon. Rated T.


**Undisclosed**

**A/N: awful-aus at one point put up this prompt and it showed up in my Pinterest feed and it felt so Jily. :) I'm tweaking it just a bit to make it fit in canon. "So we've never met but our showers are on opposite sides of the same apartment wall so sometimes we're showering at the same time and we sing duets."**

Lily reasoned that she didn't need to tell James anything. It would only cause problems. She was best to leave it be.

"Alright, Evans?" James spoke into her ear and Lily shivered as his arms pulled her into him. "You look worried."

Lily bit her lip, and then immediately let it go and forced a smile. "I was just thinking about the latest rounds chart. Do you think we've overscheduled Remus?"

It was a blatant lie, but a good one because it would keep James off her guilty conscience.

James spun her around like they were dancing and laughed. "If anything he's going to complain we didn't give him enough slots. Don't stress, love, he'll be fine, I'll see to it."

Lily smiled. She knew Remus would be fine, but she wasn't as sure about herself.

Apparently, James wasn't the only one who noticed something was up.

"Everything ok Lily?" Remus asked as they walked out of Runes. "You seem distracted."

Lily shook her head quickly, "I'm fine."

"Er, if you say so," Remus cocked his eyebrow at her and Lily tried to discreetly take a deep breath before smiling at him.

"I got sort of caught up in one of the runes and was having trouble coming back into the real world." She put a hand on his arm, "Thanks for pulling me back."

Remus grinned, and Lily hid her sigh of relief.

Why was everyone on to her secret?

She managed to make it through the rest of the day with a decent poker face. The next morning though, her guilt caught up to her.

Marlene wandered back to their dorm early while Lily held her shower caddy and debated with herself.

"You going to shower or just stand there with your stuff?" Marlene asked quietly to keep from waking the other girls.

Lily sighed and Marlene gave her a pointed look.

"Spill, Red."

"You never called me Red before you started dating, Black." Lily deflected.

"I'm not dating Black," Marlene didn't look at her as she said it. "Are you telling me what's wrong or not?"

Lily growled, "So you can make fun of me?"

Marlene paused at her wardrobe, turning to face Lily. "I'm very fond of you. I know we didn't always see eye to eye, but I hope you know that you're one of my closest friends."

"Now I sound like an arse," Lily groaned, but smiled at Marlene. "I'm sorry, I'm just not sure what to do right now."

"I'm happy to help if you want it."

"Ok, but you can't tell James," Lily whispered a little louder.

Marlene sighed, "Fine, now tell me."

"I sing in the shower," Lily looked down at her feet.

"That sounds harmless."

"I sing duets."

"Like with one of the other girls?" Marlene leant against the wall as Lily felt her face grow hot.

"No, with one of the boys, on the other side of the wall." Lily chanced looking up at Marlene and found the girl covering her mouth and nose as she laughed.

"Oi! It's not funny!"

Marlene just laughed harder.

Lily stormed out, leaving Marlene laughing against the wall.

She might as well shower, and with how long she took trying to talk to Marlene she'd probably missed the mysterious duet partner by now anyway.

It was still early enough that she had the showers to herself, so at least there was that. But as she stepped into her favorite stall, Lily heard his voice as he sang Boston's More Than a Feeling. It was one of his favorites based on how much they'd sung it in the last two years. And Lily smiled, giving into how much she loved this part of her days and joined in.

They sang for nearly twenty minutes before Lily was done showering and fixing her hair. Then she stepped out to let her duet partner go back to his solos. Her guilt met her on the other side of the door.

She'd tell James. He could figure out who she was singing with and they could prove that all this was a platonic duet arrangement. Her mum had talked about singing with choirs and she'd sung all sorts of songs with men she only knew long enough to perform the number with before they both moved on to the next piece. James would understand, surely he would.

Lily walked down the steps but stopped short of the common room when she heard it. He wasn't singing as loud as he did in the shower, but he was singing clearly, and he was singing More Than A Feeling.

It was him.

Lily wasn't sure what to do next. A larger part of her wanted to see who it was she'd been singing with since fourth year. But part of her was terrified of knowing. What if it changed everything? What if it made things weird? But what if she never found out who she'd been singing with?

Slowly, Lily peaked out from the stairs to find none other than the Head Boy himself, her boyfriend singing quietly while he tossed that practice Snitch around.

Lily thought she might faint dead away.

It was James! It had been James all along! Well, of course, it had. She'd was realizing that she'd spent a fair amount of her time at Hogwarts attracted to James Potter, and that fact that he was her duet partner only added to why she'd felt that way.

Lily's next move was instinctual. She started singing. Then she slowly stepped out into the common room.

James had fallen silent, but his face held a smile that barely fit.

"Peter owes me a Galleon," he closed the distance between them and bright his lips to hers.

Lily melted into him, melted into the relief that she didn't need to worry because she had only been singing with her boyfriend. It felt like fifty pounds being pulled from her shoulders

"I knew it was you, it had to be you." James murmured against her as he moved his lips to her neck, making Lily's knees start to buckle beneath her.

Lily sighed, trying to keep upright and coherent.

"James," she sighed, "why is More Than A Feeling your favorite?"

James stilled and Lily wondered if he had miss heard her. Then James buried his head in the crook of her neck and sighed.

"For a while, it was because I felt like it was about me. But now, now it reminds me not to take you for granted because you almost were my Marianne."

Lily gripped at the hair at the nape of his neck and pressed herself against him.

"I'm not walking away, James," she pulled his head up to look at her, "not ever."

James smile returned to his face, but Lily only saw it for a fraction of a second before his lips had reconnected with hers and he pressed her against the wall.

"I'm never walking away either," James whispered as he kissed her.

And they didn't stop kissing until Peter came down and James demanded payment for their bet.


End file.
